Extended Development
by neon.nighthawk
Summary: Pre-series, Baltimore: Detective Anthony DiNozzo wants nothing to do with the homicide case of a Lance Corporal found by the harbor. It's not even his jurisdiction. So why, exactly, is Agent Gibbs forcing him to work the case? AU, not slash.
1. Prologue: Senior & a Scotch

Anthony Dinozzo, Sr. rarely appeared in bars, a strong believer that a man of his stature should not be seen in such places.

But on a January night not long after divorce not-quite-a-double-digit-number-but-quickly-getting-there, he found a hole in the wall dingy one to sneak into for a scotch. The kind of bar that played the kind of jazz his late wife loved. The kind that had cigar smoke hanging in the air and lonely men hanging onto the photographs in their wallets long after the smiles looking up at them had left.

He sat at the bar and tapped his fingers to the missing drum beats in the song playing, ordered his scotch, and fully expected to be left alone as was in the nature of these kind of bars and their inhabitants. These quiet bars.

But two bar stools over, a man with ambulance eyes sat down, a tin box clutched in his hands. Senior heard him order a beer and watched as this man turned to face him.

"You got kids?" he asked, his eyes bright with hope and regret.

When Senior did not respond, the man continued, a voice of shock and sadness, "Someone mailed this box to me today." Senior glanced at the object in the man's hand. Rust and red paint.

The man continued, "I buried it in my backyard when I was eight. When you're eight, you think it's so cool and there's no way you'll forget. But I did, of course. Crazy, huh? Someone found my buried treasure and now it's like childhood was yesterday." His voice hitched. Senior glanced at the bartender, a dry, unamused expression on his face asking the bartender to help him ditch this rambling man.

The bartender only shrugged in response, and the man started to speak again, "Got me thinkin' about my boy. When he was young he loved stuff like this. The whole digging up the past thing at least. Always said he wanted to be an archaeologist and find a whole city in the dirt like Pompeii." The man let out a scoff of laughter. "Smart kid, huh? What eight year old knows about stuff like Pompeii?" The man clutched his drink, fixing his gaze intently on the amber liquid inside. Senior suppressed the urge to roll his eyes.

"But I haven't talked to my kid in ten years. He has his own kid now, or so I hear." The man looked at Senior again, his eyes like a hand in the dark searching for a light switch.

He didn't find the light switch. Senior just stared, narrowed his eyes, and wondered why this man thought he'd care about his life story at all. But the persistent man continued despite this, something inside of him needing to get these words out before the pit in his stomach choked his resolve.

"Makes me think I should maybe talk to him, before it's too late. Before I'm buried in my own box." The man finished with his gaze on the box and a crack in his voice. He looked back at his drink, done with the mute man he'd been trying to engage.

Anthony Dinozzo Senior returned his gaze to his own scotch and took a sip like the man next to him hadn't just bared his soul. Senior didn't have a pit in his stomach or a desire to erase lost chances.

Anthony Dinozzo, Sr. never took the universe's hint. The hand in the man's eyes had reached too far. Because the next day, the silver-haired man sitting with a bourbon in the corner booth - the man staring at the photograph of a little girl and a smiling redhead who had their own boxes now - this man, met Anthony Dinozzo, Jr.


	2. Exotic Names & Unrequited Recruitment

"Some people swallow the universe like a pill; they travel on through the world, like smiling images pushed from behind." - Robert Louis Stevenson

 **Baltimore, 5:32 A.M.**

Januaries in Baltimore were like sticking your tongue out to taste snow, and then realizing the grey clouds in the sky were actually shedding Jack Frost's tears, bitter and salty.

Detective Anthony Dinozzo didn't much mind the grey or the snow or the cold in Baltimore. But he minded that the streetlamp by his crime scene was burnt out, and he'd been woken at five in the morning to come squint at his newest case in the dark.

And of course his partner couldn't be bothered to even pick up the phone, leaving Tony to run the scene by himself.

He sketched the scene as best he could from the flashlight in his hand, wondering why he even bothered when the case would be taken over soon enough.

Lance Corporal Colin Becker sat perched on a bench overlooking the Baltimore Harbor, an oversized raincoat hiding the bullet hole in his chest. No one knew yet how long the young man had been there. To any passers-by, the man would have appeared merely to be catching a nap.

Indeed, his body had been staged quite well. It was not until the early morning hours that anyone even realized he was dead. Aid workers at a local homeless shelter were doing a street outreach, offering people blankets, toiletry bags, and rides to the shelter. One of the workers happened upon the Lance Corporal and tried to wake him. It did not take long to ascertain that the man on the bench would not be waking any time soon.

The officers who responded to the call found the man's dog tags and identification information easily. No attempts had been made to hide his identity.

Three hours later, Tony had pulled up to the scene. He had one of the officers take pictures while he sketched. Though he'd probably get better photographs and sketches once the sun came out - if the case was even still theirs.

When Gibbs pulled up to the crime scene, he was not happy. The roads were just slick enough that his normal pace of driving was out of the question, and the call for the case had come so early he hadn't even gone to sleep yet as his plans for the weekend were to finish the skeleton of the boat in his basement.

He slammed the door and approached the yellow tape, hoping the local LEOs had not disrupted the scene after notifying him of its existence. He flashed his identification at the officers by the tape, taking note of the burnt out street light near the bench where the current victim still lay.

A man stood in jeans and a navy coat near the scene with a notebook, perhaps taking notes or sketching.

Gibbs approached the man at a swift pace, speaking as soon as the man was in hearing range. "This is my scene. Special Agent Gibbs, NCIS." He once again flashed his identification. "You are?"

The man glanced at Gibbs' badge. Already annoyed with how long it took NCIS to arrive and relieve him of the scene, the agent's immediate and apparent contempt prompted his own rudeness. "I am the reason you were notified of this crime scene. What took you so long to get here?" The man demanded, mirroring the agent's tone.

Gibbs responded only with a glare – a particularly intense one he hoped would silence the young man in front of him.

Instead, the young detective just rolled his eyes. "Well at least you're here now. I assume you'll want to take over from here?"

"It's my scene," he repeated with a curt nod.

"The body has only been touched by the outreach worker who found him and by the first officer on sight, briefly and only to find initial identification which is how the dog tags were located and we knew to call you. Identification reads Lance Corporal Colin Becker. The scene has been blocked off for the last five hours; first officer arrived on the scene at 0100 hours after a call from Sue Harmon, an outreach worker with a local homeless shelter.

"Yesterday, last night, and until 0600 this morning, homeless shelter volunteers and employees have been locating homeless for the annual Point in Time count. They have to record certain information about anyone they find on the streets, then they usually offer emergency assistance. Ms. Harmon thought our victim was sleeping and needed to wake him for the count.

"Temperatures were crazy cold last night, around 15 degrees at the lowest, which was Ms. Harmon's concern, and now yours because that will likely mess with time of death. We have collected contact information and preliminary statements of any witnesses who were in the vicinity, though that really only consisted of the outreach workers; any others disappeared by the time the first responder arrived. Sue Harmon is still here, but the other workers left to continue the count.

"This is a pretty common hotspot for homeless to hang around. I'd recommend a canvas of the area tomorrow night. You could ask Ms. Harmon and her fellow volunteers to provide you with the names or at least shelter locations of those who they entered into emergency shelters last night from this area. They'll probably be able to tell you more than the outreach workers can.

"Only cameras in the vicinity that I'm aware of are at an ATM on the corner of there," he pointed across the street to an intersection. "And at the traffic light by that ATM. I'm thinking that convenience store might have something inside though and maybe it caught something from the street or at least some people who were around here last night. Any questions?"

"Yeah. Just one," Gibbs said, looking at the younger man expectantly.

"I have a list here of all the names you'll need, including the first officers on the scene," he ripped a page out of his notebook, figuring the agent was referring to the names so he could start his investigation.

"Good, but I was actually referring to your name," Gibbs bit out, impatient but not quite rude. The man in front of him seemed competent enough and had actually given Gibbs more information than he usually ever hoped for from local officers, but he still hadn't answered the first question Gibbs had thrown his way.

"Detective Anthony DiNozzo, Baltimore PD. You can call me Tony." Tony responded with a smile, offering his hand for the man to shake.

Gibbs glanced at the hand, but did not take it. He'd heard the name before; he was sure of it. He just couldn't place where.

Instead, he glanced towards his car where Ducky's assistant was now parking the truck. Both men began making their way over to Gibbs.

"She was quite delightful, I must say. It's a shame he put the ring in chocolate. Marcy wasn't one to savor that particular candy. By the time he returned to the room and performed the Heimlich, she'd lost quite a bit of oxygen to the brain. Never was quite the same, but mother did love to have her over for tea. She could make a biscotti rivaled by no others," the Doctor finished his story upon reaching the two men.

"Jethro! We arrived as soon as we could. We hit a bit of a bad patch there on the highway. But if you direct us to the body, we will get to work." He took the gloves his assistant handed him and glanced at Tony. "Oh! Do forgive me. I didn't see you there. I'm Dr. Donald Mallard and this is my assistant Gerald. Who might you be, my dear boy?"

"Detective Anthony DiNozzo, Doctor. Please call me Tony. I was just giving _Jethro_ here the last of the information I have on his case and then Baltimore PD will be out of your hair," he finished with an amused smile, genuine even, and un-phased by the subsequent glare he received at the use of Gibbs' name.

"He says the temperatures last night got down to at least 15 degrees, Duck. I think time of death might be difficult this time," Gibbs cut in on the introductions.

"Wow, Duck and Jethro. Do you have to have a funky name to get into NCIS? I'm glad they made an exception for you, Gerald," Tony shared a smile with the medical examiner's assistant.

At Gibbs' glare this time, he amended himself. "Not that Jethro isn't a great name. Because it totally has an exotic element there, almost like Pedro. _Ped_ ro, _Jeth_ ro. Yeah, I'm sure it's a chick magnet," the glare did not falter, "but I'll stop now because obviously you know all this. It's your name after all." He finished with a charming smile, full on, as he seemed to do often. And perhaps Gibbs would have been more annoyed if he weren't trying so hard to place the man's name.

Still unimpressed, Gibbs thought he should nip the use of his given name in the bud, "You call me Gibbs." He used his demanding-and-dangerous voice, the one with a very high success rate for manipulating the actions of others.

The detective smiled, this time with thinner lips, and Gibbs felt his mood lift as the young man portrayed his annoyance. "How about I call you nothing since this is your case and not mine. If you don't need anything else, I'd like to be on my way." Though he sounded quite amicable, lighthearted even, Gibbs could tell the detective was losing his patience. He'd been trying to leave practically since Gibbs had arrived. Most local LEOs were not so compliant.

Then again, most local LEOs didn't quite comprehend jurisdiction. They'd try to fight for a case but have no leg to stand on. This guy probably just understood jurisdiction. That or he didn't want the case; why want what you can't have?

Didn't matter to Gibbs. Or, at least, shouldn't matter. He got what he wanted. Relevant case information and then the local law enforcement out of his way. The kid had probably just encountered enough Feds to know better than to fight-

And that's when it hit him, a memory bubbling in chest.

 **Dinner, Gibbs' House, 15 months ago**

"You know they make grills for this kind of thing, right?" Fornell goaded as he watched his friend sit by the fireplace and turn over their steaks.

"Don't need one. Got a fireplace," Gibbs said.

"Cheap bastard. You sure it's not 'cause you got alimony payments?" Fornell smirked.

"Careful, Fornell. Wouldn't want to accidentally drop your steak in the fire. Then you'd be stuck eating beans from a can."

"Yeah, yeah. Like a cheap bastard would waste something so expensive."

"Either I waste it on you or waste it in the fireplace. Don't see much difference."

"You just don't see much. I heard you've been squinting again."

Gibbs glared, "Who told you that?"

"Abby assisted on a case a couple months ago. She's worried you're damaging the something or other in your eyes by not getting 'em checked out."

"Should've known," Gibbs sighed.

"How's the team?" Fornell asked.

"Burley's leaving. They're sticking me with green probies. I've had two so far. Both transferred out within a month."

"Gee, I wonder why," Fornell deadpanned.

Gibbs rolled his eyes. "It's for the best. How's your team?"

"Same. Still a man down."

"Can't find an agent who'll put up with you, Fornell?"

"Oh I found one, alright. He just doesn't want the job."

Gibbs raised his eyebrows, disbelief warring with curiosity.

"Case in Philly. Kid detective, DiNutzo. He's a pain in the ass who doesn't even say his own name right, but he's got a knack for making connections no one else can see."

"Why'd he say no?"

Fornell rolled his eyes and stabbed at a piece of steak with his fork. "He says he's happy where he is. He's loyal to the badge. Not so much to the precinct, but he sure as hell seems attached to the men in blue. Bad blood with feds, I think."

Fornell hadn't said much else that day. But next month, Gibbs met his friend for lunch. On the way to the deli, Fornell pulled a letter out of his coat pocket to stick into a post office box. The name read _Anthony Dinozzo._ Tobias told Gibbs he sent one every month, grumbling about wasted time for a man who never even responded.

If Gibbs weren't so focused on teasing the FBI agent about his unsuccessful and pathetic attempts at getting this Dinozzo guy to work for him, he would've been impressed that said man could inspire such fervent attempts at recruitment by the likes of Tobias Fornell.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Gibbs watched the young man walk briskly away from the scene. He wanted to feel satisfied that, for once, things had gone his way. He wanted to feel relieved the locals wouldn't be a pain in his side throughout the whole investigation. Instead, he just felt a churning in his gut, and for the first time in years, Gibbs wasn't sure what his gut was trying to tell him.

But as the young man pulled away in his car and the sun began to inch its way over the water on the harbor, Gibbs turned his attention to the Lance Corporal on the bench and started processing the scene. He wasn't here to meddle with young detectives, especially not young detectives who had Fornell enamored. He was here for the marine. He was here for justice.


	3. Better Worlds & Angry Words

**Thanks so much for all your kind words and reviews! Very unexpected. Here's the next chapter. Enjoy 3**

xxx

Some people fashion their lives after a dream or a demand.

Tony DiNozzo had always fashioned his after the movies.

He looked at life through a film noir lens, never quite able to escape the colorless undertones of unsettling mystery and loneliness. And never quite sure if he wanted to. Abandoned alleys and gloomy towns were in his blood and had been ever since he first saw _The Third Man_ at the impressionable age of nine. He'd once lived in a world of escape, with Tom Selleck and Sean Connery as his heroes, and maybe he didn't always escape to a better world but at least to worlds where good guys persisted, conquering bad guys despite their loneliness and gloomy towns.

When he could finally escape in real life, he naturally looked to his movies for guidance.

While his classmates chose universities for their programs or location, Tony chose his for _Goodbye, Columbus_ , because the main character was a basketball player like himself and the OSU sports commentary radio show in the movie was quite possibly the most entrancing account of sports Tony had ever heard in his seventeen years of life.

That movie hadn't steered him wrong. Four years later, Tony left The Ohio State University with the greatest memories of his life. Just like the brother in the movie, he sang "Hello Life, Goodbye Columbus" as he contemplated his next move - and the movie to lead him there.

Because while his classmates had hometowns with family members or girlfriends waiting, Tony had only his beloved car and no ties to anything but the future.

He wasn't exactly happy to be leaving college in the dust, having found a community he enjoyed for the first time in his life. He picked a classic film to catapult his departure - _The Beautiful Melody_ , a Best Picture back in 1929. Hank and her singing partner leave for Peoria at the end of the film, not with excitement but certainly with motivation. Tony could relate, and the Peoria PD had an open spot for him.

He stayed just long enough to get a detective badge, leaving the drama of Peoria behind for Philly because _The Philadelphia Story_ had a lighthearted element his life had been missing since his days at OSU and Cary Grant was the kind of suave he'd always wanted to be. Philly PD had its ups and downs, and two years in, Tony was ready to find a precinct where he could do his job in peace, without captains or federal agents mucking things up for their own personal gains. He hated to be a pawn in political games of law enforcement and government.

He wanted something different. He wanted simplicity or at least reprieve.

And that's where _And Justice for All_ came in. Arthur Kirkland had quite the life - a surrogate father who stepped in when his parents let him down, a supportive girlfriend, and the resolve to fight for justice even at the expense of his own career. In Baltimore, Tony would be like Al Pacino's character in the movie: determined to do better and find justice, no matter the cost.

Baltimore was supposed to be coming up for fresh air; it was supposed to be finding justice without the politics, cover ups, and drama he'd been exposed to in Peoria and Philly. Lately, Baltimore hadn't been any of those things. It seemed two years was Tony's time stamp for contentment in a police department.

He just had to figure out where to go from here.

But a glance through his three shelves of films fostered no inspiration, and he began to wonder if maybe it was time to look beyond the world of screenplays and film sets for his future. Sure, Peoria, Philly, and Baltimore had all started out pretty nice - nice enough for him to try to stick it out and stay when things got rough. But look where that had got him? Nowhere, not really.

He had the day off - another reason being called to the scene this morning had hit a nerve - and if he only knew _where_ to go, he could start putting together his resume. He could start moving on.

Instead, he pulled a hoodie over his t-shirt and stuffed his Walkman into the hand pouch, deciding a jog with Sinatra would clear his head.

Maybe this afternoon, he would finally have the time to look through those cold case files cluttering the desk in his bedroom. Anything to take his mind off unknown futures and the bitterness he felt in his bones every time he left work these days.

xxx

Gibbs didn't have time for jogging or self reflection today. His latest probie had quit, possibly because Gibbs hadn't been too nice when said probationary agent failed to show up to the scene this morning. Gibbs was pretty sure the guy just couldn't handle a good dressing down - which he'd gotten.

Gibbs had been hoping this man would leave since the day he started. His name had way too many syllables to remember, and even Ducky hadn't warmed up to him. Not for the first time, Gibbs considered adding a rule to his ever growing list of them: If a kind Scotsman named Ducky who's never met a stranger doesn't like you, _leave._ The only flaw, of course, being that Ducky would never come right out and say whether he did or did not like someone, and if asked, could probably find something nice to say about even the most wretched characters.

Rules aside, Gibbs hadn't filled the other spot on their team yet, still sifting through the unqualified probationary candidates Director Morrow had provided, so now he was two men down, and he didn't much like the solutions the Director had offered.

As the elevator opened and he stepped into autopsy, Gibbs put these thoughts aside. He saw Ducky by an examination table, hunched over the Lance Corporal and finishing the tail end of a story.

"What do you got for me, Duck?" He went to stand by the medical examiner.

"A very interesting young man, Jethro. Abigail found Yo Yo Ma tickets in his wallet. I was just telling him about a fascinating Baroque performance I heard during my days at Edinburgh."

"And has he told you anything about what happened to him?" Gibbs looked down at the man. Chest wound autopsies always made for an ugly image, Gibbs thought.

"Well, the gunshot wound appears to be the cause of death. As you can see, the wound entered right above his fifth rib, puncturing the lungs and causing a pulmonary edema. His lungs filled with blood from the wound, and he quite literally drowned. Certainly homicide. I have Abby working on the trajectory of the entry wound, and I am not quite done with the initial autopsy. I believe he has defensive wounds on his forearms," Ducky said, gesturing to faint bruises that lined his underarms. "As I said, I am not yet finished. I will have more for you tomorrow."

"TOD?"

"That will take time. As the detective pointed out, the temperatures last night have likely thrown an estimate off. I'll look into that soon."

"So blood went into his lungs. Would he have bled out, as well?"

"Yes. He would have died within five minutes, but there still would have been quite a significant amount of blood loss from the wound."

"Anything else?"

"Nothing salient," Ducky replied, and walked over to the trash can by the door to dispose of his gloves. "I hear you have lost another team member."

"Yep. Quit this morning," Gibbs said, following the doctor to his office. Ducky took a seat behind his desk, and Gibbs followed suit, sitting on the other side of the desk.

"Surely you won't be working this case alone," Ducky said, though his tone of voice and raised forehead clearly wanted to know his friend's plan for the current predicament.

"Director says I can have floaters."

"You don't seem pleased."

Gibbs crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes, and Ducky knew this to be his friend's unique election of a pout. "It's a homicide case an hour away in Baltimore, Ducky. Fresh eyes on the case every few days isn't going to help much." Or rather, it would slow things down _a lot_.

"And there's no way to get someone assigned to you in the next few weeks?"

Gibbs' lips involuntarily curved upward. "Morrow may have offered."

"I assume you weren't very keen on the idea?"

"I'd rather not train a new agent in the middle of a homicide case." O _r at all_ , Gibbs thought. "I told him I'd pick from his files when this case closes." Perhaps he could have told Morrow in a _nicer_ way...

"There will always be one case or another, Jethro. You really must find a team. You haven't had anyone stick around for long since Peter, and he only stayed seven months," Ducky said, referring to Peter Donovan, the agent who had been on Team Gibbs for the longest span of time since Stan Burley left.

"I'm trying, Duck. But the agents they send me-"

"Are bullied into leaving almost as soon as they arrive. It's not productive, and it certainly isn't safe." The older man had a firm voice that made Gibbs feel like a child receiving a schoolboy scolding.

Even so, his eyes shot up in dubious surprise. "Safe?"

"You need someone to back you up in the field, Jethro. This is getting out of hand. Soon, the Director won't give you a choice. You'll be stuck with agents regardless of your preference - or theirs."

Gibbs narrowed his eyes, "If they would send me just one file of an experienced agent, maybe I could find a suitable team. All they send me are agents fresh out of FLETC. _That_ 's unproductive."

"You either find a way to work with the options you are given or find your own options. Either way, you need a steady partner. Someone who will stay longer than a few months, and be scared to death the entire time they're here. Those seven months on your team seriously affected Peter's blood pressure. He left under orders from a doctor to lead a less stressful life, Jethro," Ducky berated, his voice somewhere between amused and appalled. But mostly appalled. As he saw his friend's lips tighten to hide a smirk, clearly finding humor in the situation, he continued, "That's not something to be proud of, Jethro!"

And Gibbs agreed, even if he could find humor in the situation. Ultimately, he knew he would never hold a job as team leader if he couldn't keep a team together for longer than months at a time.

"I know, Duck. I'll think about it." Their eyes met, and Ducky nodded, satisfied with his friend's answer. After seven years of friendship, he was well-versed in the ways of his friend. He knew to appreciate small steps forward whenever they presented.

xxx

That night, as Gibbs sawed wood to add to the skeleton of his basement boat, he _did_ think about what Ducky had said. He thought about the needles that shot through his spine every time he took his probationary agents into the field, with their lives and his own weighing on his every decision. He thought it would be nice to have someone out there to share the burden with - qualified enough to trust with his own life and competent enough to realize the significance of that trust.

But then images of his red-haired girls prodded their way into his conscious. They always did when he was down here; hadn't he always built these boats for them? Shannon, ever the environmentalist, teasing reproach: _you might as well be a lumberjack with all the wood you're wasting, Jethro_. Kelly, whispering colors of paint for the distant future, when he'd finally finished the boat itself.

But just thinking about the distant future was too much for him these days, so he abandoned the boat and bourbon in the basement for a lonely bed instead.

By the time he got to work the next day, he had a plan. Not a _good_ plan, exactly, but a plan better than using free agents from other teams or green agents from the training academy.

The first thing Gibbs did when he got to the office, was call the Baltimore PD's captain. He told the man who he was and reminded him of the case that had come through their territory yesterday. "I'd like to work with one of your detectives on this. NCIS feels a joint investigation is best, given our unfamiliarity with the Baltimore area." He cringed at his own words, thinking maps were invented for a reason and diplomacy should be outlawed. Nonetheless, he persisted, "I'd like to work with your best detective."

The man on the other line apparently shared Gibbs' disdain for diplomacy because he let out a snort. "You think my best detective has time to be at the beck and call of NCIS? We're a busy precinct, Agent Gibbs."

"I understand that, sir. Surely you have more than one detective qualified to assist a federal investigation."

"I can offer you assistance, of course." Ah, there was that diplomacy Gibbs loathed. The man did know what it was. "But DiNozzo's not exactly Columbo, if you catch my drift. Don't expect much."

A subtle anger pervaded his words and left a bad taste in Gibbs' gut. "He was at my scene yesterday, correct?"

An exasperated sigh escaped the Baltimore captain, but he answered, "Yes, I believe he was," and the glee in the man's voice made Gibbs wonder if he'd missed a punchline somewhere in this conversation.

Gibbs wasn't one to stick his neck out for others, especially not complete strangers. But his temper had a mind of it's own, and he found himself defending the detective to this man who thought it acceptable to casually insult those he employed to complete strangers.

"He didn't seem incompetent to me," he firmly declared, as though his trademark glares could in fact be conveyed with words. His resolve had merit, he figured. Fornell wouldn't recruit an incompetent detective, and yesterday, this DiNozzo character had been more helpful than most LEOs Gibbs had ever encountered in his years of field work. "Let your detective know I'll be there at noon to begin the investigation." He hung up without another word. Gibbs didn't care to hear anything else the man on the other line had to say.


	4. Tumbles & Tricks

**Baltimore, 11:54 A.M.**

The Baltimore PD station house had uneven wood floors and very little lighting. Dull black and white portraits lined the walls. The bustle and congestion of local departments had never appealed to Jethro Gibbs, and as he glanced the countless heads filling the room, who all seemed to have somewhere to be, he was glad for the calm, carpeted headquarters at NCIS.

An officer had offered to show Gibbs the way to the precinct captain's office, and he followed behind the man until they came to a stop outside the captain's door.

The door was left open, and Gibbs respected that - a man who made himself available to his subordinates without barriers. Gibbs took note of his discombobulated desk, the majority of which was cluttered with piles of case folders and papers.

The uniform officer introduced Gibbs and left. Captain Lou Isaacs was a short, chubby man with thinning brown hair and confident shoulders.

"Agent Gibbs," nodded the captain, standing to shake hands. Gibbs offered a hand of his own in response, and when the captain gestured for Gibbs to take a seat in the chair on the other side of his desk, Gibbs complied.

Isaacs sat in his own chair, and busied himself by sorting the pile of papers in front of him into a new piles. "Detective DiNozzo should be here soon. How's your investigation coming along?"

The man spoke formally but with genuine ease. He seemed a friendly presence, and Gibbs thought maybe his first impressions of this man had not been correct - a rare albeit _possible_ occurrence.

"We're working on a preliminary background. My ME finished his initial autopsy. Today we'll start sifting through statements from the scene for notable leads."

"Good, good," he said, still fiddling with the piles of paper in front of him.

"You wanted to see me, captain?" A voice broke in from the doorway.

"Ah, yes," Isaacs said, looking up at the detective who stood stiffly in his doorway.

DiNozzo gave a quick glimpse towards Gibbs. "I didn't realize I was interrupting your meeting. I can come back when you're through here," he said and made to leave.

"No, no. You'll be working with Agent Gibbs here on the dock case you ran last night."

Tony froze for a moment, and turned around slowly. "Come again?"

"Yes, his agency has requested a shared investigation, and you're familiar with the case." The captain said, returning to his pile-sorting dismissively. A tension fell over the room as Gibbs watched the interaction between the two Baltimore men.

"I have three open cases and two set for court in the next few weeks. What are the expectations for a _joint investigation_ here?"

Gibbs caught the sarcasm as the detective said - joint investigation - and wondered at it.

The captain stilled, dropping his current pile of desk folders to address DiNozzo. "The _expectation_ is that you focus your energy on the harbor case, as requested by your superior. Levine can handle your cases, just give him what you have so far."

Quite a severe tone for a question that seemed reasonable enough, Gibbs thought, and waited to see how the detective would react.

But very little reaction came, save for a slightly tenser jaw as Detective DiNozzo answered, "I see," and turned to leave.

"Well Agent Gibbs, if there's nothing else you wish to discuss, I have quite a bit to sift through here," Isaacs spoke, gesturing to his desk. The conversation with DiNozzo seemed to have put the man in a mood, so Gibbs gave him a curt nod and left quickly, much like the detective had.

Something about Isaacs was off, but so far, only when Detective DiNozzo was in the mix. There had to be some unpleasant history there, Gibbs reasoned, but filed it away as a mere observation. He rarely had the patience to investigate his own strained relationships, so he had long elected to extend the same ignorance to the relationships of those around him. As long as it didn't affect his case, he saw no reason to care.

He located Detective DiNozzo's desk easily enough. Propped against the back wall of the precinct, it was flooding with piles of papers and files. Gibbs had thought the captain's desk to be crowded, but not compared to this monstrosity.

Amidst the piles sat a computer and a wide variety of trinkets that looked more fitting for a first grader's desk than a detective's. A Snoopy figurine sat atop one pile, as though guarding it. A mighty mouse stapler marked another. A can of Popeye's spinach held pens, pencils, and three Pez dispensers.

He watched as DiNozzo approached one of the piles and cautiously slumped over it to slowly nudge a middle folder out.

Gibbs slowly approached. "Looking for something?" he asked.

DiNozzo had carefully retrieved half of the folder without any piles tumbling to chaos, but upon hearing Agent Gibbs' voice, he felt a jolt of adrenalin at the unexpected placement of the man, who stood only a few steps behind him. The pile he had been carefully maneuvering tumbled to the ground and spilled over onto other piles on the desk, creating a domino effect of sorts.

The detective stood up and slumped his shoulders, then turned around to face the agent.

"Agent Gibbs," he said with a strained, pitying smile, "Haven't you ever played a game of Operation?"

The comical tumble of files and Tony's unexpected question instead of rage, had caught Gibbs off guard. He cleared his throat to hide what may have been an amused smile and couldn't help but think of a night by the fire with this game and his daughter.

Then dropped his right hand - fast - upon realizing he had it mid air, motioning tweezers with raised eyebrows, the custom when asking yes and no questions in sign language.

Tony's smile morphed into a more genuine one. "Yes, that Operation," he said, his voice gleeful at the image of the gruff agent in front of him bent over the children's game to extract brain freeze ice cream or stomach butterflies.

Gibbs felt a rush of hot blood in his veins, but didn't blush in embarrassment, not even when accidentally admitting to near strangers that he played kooky kids games.

But he certainly did not like the dancing eyes of the detective in front of him at the news.

Little bits of information like this made people human, gave glimpses of a life lived beyond case files and assertive demands, and in his line of work, Gibbs had fast learned that such dynamic knowledge evened the playing ground. Long accustomed to holding the cards and the power, evened playing ground was one in the same with a grave disadvantage in his book.

And now this kid detective had achieved such a thing within two days of meeting him - two conversations, really. Impressive.

But far more infuriating.

Determined not to let the detective catch him off guard again, Gibbs reaffirmed his footing and posture as though a strong presence could be a deterrent. Realizing DiNozzo was still talking, Gibbs tuned in, hoping he hadn't missed anything salient. The last thing he needed was to appear foolishly unable to follow a conversation.

"-it's just bad sportsmanship. I mean, I was in the _zone_ , Gibbs. You shattered the slam dunk of folder extraction, just now. I know I make it look easy, but this is a skill of great mental and physical fitness. Like luge or parkour. And you just come right along and sneak up on a guy when he's mid-folder tug." Tony shook his head in mock disappointment.

He continued, "But I'm a reasonable guy, Agent Gibbs, so even though my entire filing system is shot to hell, we can put this behind us. I won't even break out the superglue.

"All I ask, is that next time, you consider the golden rule of Operation and give a guy some space. Maybe even some silence. What do you say?" Tony finished his monologue with open arms and the tone of a patronising peacemaker, like he was asking little Jonny to stop pushing people on the playground. An infectious humor sailed the undercurrents of his words.

Overwhelmed by the words thrown into the mix ( _what did parkour and superglue have to do with filing systems?_ ) and annoyed that the detective felt comfortable enough to tease him ( _because surely he wasn't serious...right?_ ), Gibbs did what he always did when he had no clue how to respond to someone.

He kept narrowed eyes trained on the detective but offered no response.

Most felt awkward or embarrassed when confronted with a silent, staring Jethro Gibbs. Anthony DiNozzo did not; rather, he tilted his head and stared back.

Eventually, he nodded amicably. "Good talk." He gave Gibbs a pat on his upper arm, "I'll take your silence as a peace offering."

He turned away and began gathering files from the floor. Gibbs watched him, still trying to comprehend the absurdity of their interaction.

"I need to get a few things handed off to my partner before we discuss your case." Tony broke the silence first, his humorous tone suddenly gone. Gibbs got the impression the detective wasn't exactly happy about the joint investigation.

"How long should that take?"

"Give me thirty minutes."

Gibbs gave a curt nod. "Going for coffee then."

He was gone before Tony could even respond, stepping briskly through the crowded room of desks and officers.

Tony watched him leave for a moment, then continued sifting through his scattered files until he found what he needed. He wished he had time to sort everything properly, but knew a half hour wouldn't be enough time to get his desk back in order.

The desk situation was a nuisance, but he could deal with it, especially since he'd quite enjoyed going off on the agent just now. And that the agent had let him.

Of course, he usually hoped for a smile or a laugh after such a performance, but in his experience, feds were always a bit slower on the comedic uptake. He welcomed the challenge.

Even if he didn't welcome the situation. It was really grating on his nerves, had been ever since he left the captain's doorway.

No warning, no heads up - just a quick hand off to the feds with an order to give Sam all his open cases. Cases that, theoretically, his partner should be all caught up on and working alongside him to close. But their partnership had dissolved quickly this past month.

Detective Sam Levine wasn't a bad cop, but he had a bad case of misplaced blame when it came to Tony, and his pervading animosity simply wasn't conducive to collaboration on cases or safety in the field.

Tony gathered the information Sam would need, then talked to Officer Mason, who had been his backup of late. Mason wanted to make detective, and Tony had enjoyed giving him a chance to work the investigations.

He let Mason know Levine was lead on his cases for now. Tony didn't need to spell it out any further; Mason knew his involvement ended when Tony's did.

By the time he was ready to hand everything off to Sam, Tony's anger levels had risen to a place they hadn't been in quite some time. Investigations with federal law enforcement never ended well, not in his experience, and here he was, being thrown into one without his consent and without a co-worker to share the frustration with. The majority of PD employees lived their whole careers without a single run-in with a federal investigation. He couldn't seem to go two years without an unwelcome fed in his life. A month, if you wanted to be technical about it, since Fornell's stubborn letters liked to appear frequently enough.

He approached Sam's desk with thoughts of federal corruption swirling in his memory. Of unrepentant feds catching lowly local LEOs in their crossfire.

"Isaacs says you should take lead on these three cases," Tony said, gesturing to the pile of folders he presently held.

Sam Levine had scruffy black hair and a surprisingly raspy voice given his young age. He turned his gaze from his computer screen to Tony. "Probably because he wants them to actually be _solved_. Must be hard for you to do your job without your usual tricks, huh?"

"My usual tricks?" Monotoned voice and tense jaw, Tony took the bait.

"You know, premature raids on trigger-happy thugs. Everyone at your beck and call. Things sure took a turn for you, eh, _Die_ Nozzo?" Right down to his subtly offensive pronunciation of Tony's last name, Sam's tone was biting but expected.

That was the thing about Sam. He was predictable. Tony could have recited their entire conversation before even approaching Sam at all, because they'd had this same one countless times already.

"Well, Sammy, I'd love to stay and chat," Tony said, in a voice that clearly indicated he wouldn't. "But why bother? You've got nothing new to say."

Tony paused a moment, his eyes widening at a realization. "How have I not realized before? This is _Groundhog Day_. I'm Phil Connors," His voice held a lighter tone as he contemplated this for a moment. "Except I'm no ice sculptor and you're _definitely_ no Rita. Hey, maybe you can be Punxsutawney Phil instead."

His mood seemingly rejuvenated, Tony told Sam that Officer Mason was at all three scenes and could help with the cases if needed. Sam scoffed at this.

"And while I'm doing your job for you, what will you be doing?" he asked. "Or have you finally been canned?"

"I've been loaned out to the alphabet soup." He smoothed his tie, and forced a brittle smile. "I'm a man in high demand, you see, so I should really be off to look for the agent I'm supposed to be working with." He glanced at the wall clock, then added, "He doesn't seem the type who likes to be kept waiting."

"You got that right," Gibbs acknowledged as he walked up behind Tony.

Tony jolted, startled once again by the agent. "How do you _do_ that?" he asked, slitting his eyes on the agent, then on the agent's shoes.

"Are those slipper shoes?" he inquired. "How do you get them to look so real?"

Tony looked at his own shoes, then back at the Gibbs' shoes. "Hey, can I have your shoes guy's number? Because my shoe guy is clearly lacking in the creativity department. Nice guy, really, but the things I could do-"

As the detective started bending down, his hand outstretched towards the shoes in question, Gibbs took a step back and cut off Tony's thought.

"You done here?" he asked, an uncalled for intensity in his gaze, then gave a quick look towards Detective Levine, who sat fiddling with his computer, uninterested in Tony's antics.

By the time Gibbs looked back at him, Tony was standing again and gave a brief nod at the question.

"Grab your gear then," Gibbs demanded and turned to walk towards the front doors.

Feeling foolish for his shoe monologue, an effort to distract the agent from any bits of conversation he may have heard before interrupting, Tony watched Gibbs leave the precinct with a mystified expression.

But only for a moment. Then he quickly started moving to his desk to grab his things. He didn't know much about Agent Gibbs yet - the guy didn't seem too keen on using words - but now he knew one thing for sure: the man did not like to be kept waiting.


End file.
